What is India eating?

Surveys reveal that biryani is the most preferred dish in the country when customers order online. By Team Viva

Even though food needs no reason to be celebrated, but special occasions and festivals always add colour to our meals making them perfect.

A survey by food ordering and delivering app, Foodpanda, researched over what is India ordering at special occasions, the most recent one being, New Year’s Eve.

The eve saw India celebrating the night by ordering in vociferously. Well, biryani turned out to be its favourite. As per the survey, more than 20,000 biryanis were ordered and delivered to customers across India on December 31, 2018. Adding to that, over 300 biryanis were delivered in the last 30 minutes leading to 2019. Other popular food items on the eve were Black Forest chocolate cake, chicken rolls, burgers and fried rice.

An interesting observation brought into notice a customer from Mumbai, who ordered food as many as 22 times on the eve. Customers from Hyderabad, Delhi NCR, Bengaluru, Mumbai and Vizag were hooked on to the app.

Another food ordering app, Swiggy observed that desi or traditional Indian dishes seemed to rule the roost during the festive season.

Some popular items were Laddu and Karanji, that saw a whopping 400 per cent increase during Ganesh Chaturthi the previous year.

The most-loved food

As per the Foodpanda survey, it has been observed that Indians love to order biryani, burgers, shakes and ice-creams.

There are different dish preferences for different times of the day. While favourite breakfast turned out to be idli and dosa, most loved lunch items happened to be biryani and shakes.

A commonality between lunch and evening meals were shakes and ice-creams, and has dumplings and pasta.

While the favourite dinner dish turned out to be chicken biryani, the go-to meal for late night hunger was also the same including rolls.

According to Swiggy, the most-searched for food item appeared to be pizza, chicken, burger and cake. The most ordered dishes according to the app were chicken biryani, masala dosa, paneer butter masala, mutton biryani, chicken fried rice, tandoori chicken and dal makhani.

The most ordered locations

As per the Foodpanda survey, cities like Delhi-NCR, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Mumbai had the highest graph in terms of ordering food online.

While chicken biryani again emerged as the most-ordered dish in Hyderabad, on the other hand, Delhiites order tikkas and butter chicken the most. However, an emerging new trend observed in Delhi-NCR region was ordering hakka noodles along with chicken tikka.

Swiggy observed how people are making conscious efforts towards mindful eating, and opting for healthy meals and eco-friendly packaging options. Cities like Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Chennai appear on top when it comes to ordering healthy food online.

While Mumbaikars came big on milkshakes and burgers, sugar-free juices and fruit and vegetable salads got more attention in Bengaluru.

Soon-to-be-metros, and cities like Vizag, Jaipur, Bhubaneswar, were found drooling over thaalis and sweets the most. While Vizag had chicken biryani and masala dosa the most, people in Bhubaneswar relished rasgulla after their meal. Dishes like chole bhature, rolls, chicken tikka were the comfort food of the Northern region whereas biryanis, burgers and salads were big hits in southern India.

The top searches in western India were food items like shakes, ice-cream, paav bhaaji, whereas the eastern cities binged on chicken biryani, rasgulla and desserts.

The survey also observed that most number of orders are made between 8 to 9 pm, showing that dinner time is people’s favourite.